BREADTH OF PERSIAN CORE VOCABULARY FOR URDU SPEAKERS: A PERSIAN CORPUS-BASED STUDY

Abstract

Vocabulary building of a foreign language is one of the difficult tasks for non-native learners and teachers. Traditionally, vocabulary building off a foreign language has been under the control of language teachers. Currently, there is a shift in foreign language learning from teacher’s control to learner’s autonomy. The idea has gained strength and the advent of computers and language corpora have facilitated this autonomy of the learners. According to Henriksen (1999),  learners of a foreign language at various stages of language learning will be having different types of vocabulary in different number. The undertaken study is an attempt in this regard to facilitate Persian learners of Urdu speakers to provide them a list of core vocabulary of Persian language that will cover nearly all spheres of Persian culture. Corpus of Persian language, compiled byShlomoArgamon, a research group, at Illinois Institute of Technology,has been used. To process the corpus data, Sketch Enginesoftware has been used. The list of core Persian vocabulary is supposed to be useful for Persian language teachers, learners,lexicologists, lexicographers and Persian grammarians.